The invention relates to a splash resistant cup lid and a method of making same and in particular to a lid of the type for use on disposable hot beverage cups or containers and a method for making a disposable cup lid which is suitable for vacuum forming.
Along with the proliferation of fast food restaurants and extensive public and private transportation such as air plane and automotive travel, has come the need for transporting potable beverages in single serving size containers which are portable, disposable, and spill resistant. Particularly annoying are spills and splashes caused by beverage sloshing resulting from the normal jostling associated with drinking beverages "on the run" as while walking, riding in public transportation, private automobiles or the like. Open top disposable containers or cups have to a great extent become common place and to a great extent standardized as to the inverted frusto conical form for hot and cold beverages. However, the cup lids for use with such containers vary greatly as to design and a completely suitable cup lid has yet to be developed.
Problems associated with cup lids for hot beverages are often distinct from those associated with cold beverages. For example, cup lids which have a centrally located straw opening have been found to be useful with cold beverage containers but are not suitable for hot beverages which are not easily consumed through a straw.
Most of the prior cup lid designs are complicated and expensive to manufacture. Many designs can only be used in conjunction with specially manufactured cups such that the cup and lid together form a reuseable assembly which must be cleaned between uses and is thus not easily adapted for fast food type beverage dispensing. Alternatively a cup lid which may be reuseable on standard size hot beverage containers might be partially suitable for fast food dispensing, but still is too expensive to be disposable and therefore must be cleaned after each use. Other designs, while potentially disposable, are difficult to make in a configuration suitable for nesting which, of course, permits economical shipment. Others simply do not act to sufficiently retard splashing or sufficiently reduce the spill rate while simultaneously permitting consumption through the lid.
The instant invention overcomes many of these drawbacks and provides an easily manufacturable, disposable, spill resistant, nestable, easily attachable cup lid through which a beverage, hot or cold, can be consumed. Further, the invention provides metered liquid flow and means for selecting a flow rate which is most convenient for the conditions of the drink and the preferred drinking speed of the consumer.
Moreover, the instant inventive cup lid can be manufactured according to the invention with a method suitable for mass production of nestable cup lids composed of coated paper, injection molded plastic, styrofoam, or vacuum formed plastic. In particular, preferred embodiments of the lid and the method of forming them relate to vacuum formed plastic cup lids.